Intelligence chiefs 'ignored WMD warnings'

Intelligence chiefs ignored warnings from their own leading experts that they could not be certain Iraq had chemical and biological weapons, a former intelligence official who gave crucial evidence to the Hutton inquiry claimed today.

In comments likely to increase pressure on the government over the issue of weapons of mass destruction, Dr Brian Jones, a former branch head in the Defence Intelligence Staff (DIS), said that the most senior intelligence officials may have "misinterpreted" key evidence on Iraq's weapons programmes.

Dr Jones laid out his claims in the Independent newspaper, which said he suggested that not a single defence intelligence expert backed Tony Blair's most contentious claims on WMD, although there is no unequivocal proof of this.

The expert claimed that a large part of the DIS was unhappy with the way raw WMD intelligence was being used without "careful caveats".

In the article, Dr Jones said he and a DIS colleague formally complained about the Iraq dossier because they feared that they would be made "scapegoats" after the war when no weapons were found.

His claims came as MPs were preparing to debate in the Commons Lord Hutton's findings from his inquiry into the death of weapons specialist Dr David Kelly, and appeared certain to raise the temperature in the chamber.

Hutton's report largely exonerated the government over the death of Dr Kelly and cleared it of "sexing up" the dossier. Some critics subsequently condemned it as a "whitewash".

Dr Jones's claims also followed the prime minister's announcement yesterday of an inquiry into the Iraq intelligence.

The article gives an account of the extraordinary tensions within the intelligence services in the run-up to the publication of the government's Iraq weapons dossier in September.

It also casts new doubt on the role played by the Joint Intelligence Committee - which includes the heads of all the intelligence agencies - and its chairman, John Scarlett.

At the time, Dr Jones headed the branch within the DIS scientific and technical directorate, which was responsible for analysing all intelligence on nuclear, chemical and biological warfare. He described his team as the "foremost group of analysts in the west" on the subject.

But he said that, when they warned that the dossier had overstated the case on Iraq's chemical weapons (CW) and biological weapons (BW) capabilities, they were overruled.

The DIS was told that the Secret Intelligence Service, MI6, had other intelligence to back up the claims but it was considered to be so sensitive that it was "compartmented" and not shown to the other agencies.

Dr Jones said that did not satisfy the experts in the DIS, however. "My belief is that right up to the publication of the dossier there was a unified view amongst not only my own staff but all the DIS experts that, on the basis of the intelligence available to them, the assessment that Iraq possessed a CW or BW capability should be carefully caveated," he said.

Dr Jones said he was concerned that the small number of very high level intelligence officials who did have access to the "compartmented" intelligence may have misinterpreted the evidence.

"I considered who might have seen this ultra-sensitive intelligence and reached the conclusion that it was extremely doubtful that anyone with a high degree of CW and BW expertise was among the exclusive group," he said.

"It is the intelligence community leadership at the level of the membership of the JIC and the upper echelons of the DIS - those who had access to and may have misinterpreted the compartmented intelligence - that had the final say on the assessment presented in the dossier."

He said that the agency chiefs and other senior officials who sat on the JIC were mostly very busy officials and may have had neither the time nor the expertise to analyse the intelligence before them properly.

He said: "When they take it upon themselves to overrule experienced experts they should be very sure of their ground and, if a decision to do so is based on additional sensitive intelligence unknown to the experts, it must be incontrovertible."

Dr Jones said that he and his DIS colleague had taken the rare step of setting out their concerns in writing because they feared they would be blamed if no weapons of mass destruction were found in Iraq.

Dr Jones's article is likely to raise fresh concerns that Mr Scarlett became too close to the Downing Street "magic circle" around the prime minister and his then communications director, Alastair Campbell.

Although Lord Hutton cleared No 10 of improper interference in the production of the dossier, he acknowledged that Mr Scarlett and other intelligence officials may have been "subconsciously" influenced by Mr Blair's call for the dossier to be as strong as possible.

The article may also reflect concerns within the agencies over where the blame will fall when Lord Butler - the former cabinet secretary appointed by Mr Blair to head the inquiry into to the Iraq intelligence - finally reports.

Commenting on the remarks made by Dr Jones, the Conservative leader, Michael Howard, told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "I think that this is very serious, very important indeed."

He said he agreed with Dr Jones's call for Mr Blair to now publish the intelligence behind the government's claims that Iraq was actively producing chemical weapons and could launch an attack within 45 minutes.

Mr Howard said people could then "form their proper opinion of the extent to which it was taken into account and of the extent to which it was turned into something else [which], in Dr Jones's words, ... was misleading".

Mr Howard also defended his decision to cooperate with the Butler inquiry, which the Liberal Democrats have refused to do on the grounds that its scope is too narrow.